Edward Harold Goin was born in 1903 in New Haven to Viola White Goin and Edward Franklin Goin, the minister of Dixwell Congregational Church. As a very young child, he lost his right arm in a trolley accident in New Haven. He attended New Haven High School (Hillhouse High School), then joined the Yale class of 1924. Both of his parents also attended Yale. While a student at Yale, he lived with his family at 573 Orchard Street. He was a member of Zeta Chapter of Alpha Phi Alpha Fraternity.
After graduating in 1924, he spent a few years teaching at historically Black universities in Georgia, Florida, and North Carolina. According to the Class of 1924’s Decennial Yearbook published in 1934, he was then principal of a high school in Welch, West Virginia. Goin reported in 1955 that his time in the South “was a rather rude awakening in many ways, and [he] was determined to work [his] way back North as soon as possible.”
He completed a master's degree in psychology at Columbia University in 1930. The same year, he married Marie Crawford, a graduate of South Carolina State University. According to census records, she was a social worker and, around 1940, secretary of the YWCA.
Upon returning to Connecticut, Goin worked for the National Youth Administration for six years. In 1942, he began working in personnel at the Winchester Repeating Arms Company, where he was employed for eleven years. He then began a role as field representative for Connecticut’s Civil Rights Commission. From 1947 to 1953, he was director of the New Haven Travelers Aid and Family Service. Around this time, he also took courses through the Yale Labor Management Institute. Goin died in 1966.
Image citation: Yale College Class of 1924 class book, Yale University Library